Senate back to 'nuclear' war over nominations

It didn’t take long for the “nuclear option” to come back to the Senate.

In quick succession, Senate Republicans held together Thursday to block two of President Barack Obama’s nominations to both the executive and judicial branches. The votes threatened to upend the relative peace that has taken hold in the Senate over the past few months since leaders agreed in July to not change the chamber’s rules by a majority vote — the “nuclear option” — to make it harder for the minority to block executive nominations.

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FLASHBACK: McConnell: Democrats' want to 'go nuclear'

FLASHBACK: Reid slams McConnell on nominees

Senate liberals — who have long pressed their leadership to rewrite the rules to allow nominations to pass with a simple majority — pointed to Thursday’s votes as yet another reason to eliminate 60-vote thresholds on procedural votes for nominees. The chamber voted 56-42 to block Rep. Mel Watt’s (D-N.C.) nomination to head the Federal Housing Finance Agency — a rare rebuke to a sitting lawmaker. Patricia Millett’s nomination to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals was stopped in a 55-38 vote.

“People are pretty upset,” said Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio), who said if he was the Senate leader he’d move toward a rules change. “Support is growing for changing the rules when they play these games.”

“The pattern of ‘obstruct and delay’ has returned as the norm in the U.S. Senate with today’s filibuster of two highly qualified nominees,” said Sen. Tom Udall (D-N.M.) “It proves once again the need to reform the Senate’s rules.”

Officially, leadership is taking a wait-and-see approach before again throwing the Senate into a chaotic battle over the filibuster, which consumed the chamber in July. But there may even more pressure to consider filibuster reform in the coming weeks, when tough votes loom over Obama’s nominees to head the Federal Reserve, the Homeland Security Department as well as two additional D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals judges.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said he wants to see how those additional judicial nominees fare before again moving toward the nuclear option.

“I’m going to file cloture on two other D.C. Circuit [nominees] and then make a decision. I’m not making it today,” Reid told reporters following a closed-door Democratic lunch. When informed that Republicans don’t believe Reid will invoke the nuclear option, Reid said, “Well, time will tell, won’t it?”

Reid also pledged to reconsider the Watt and Millett nominations “at some point in the very near future.”

But not everyone wants to proceed with such caution. Liberals want to eliminate the filibuster on nominees as soon as possible. Those Democrats — many of whom have never served in the Senate minority — believe opportunities were missed earlier this year when the Senate came to the brink of sweeping rules changes only to settle on more modest agreements to move some nominees and eliminate a few procedural hurdles.

During a lunchtime caucus with top brass from the Obama administration, the push to change the rules didn’t come up and talks focused instead on the troubled roll-out of the Affordable Care Act. But as the Senate heads home Thursday evening for a long weekend away from the Capitol, Democrats have a bitter taste left in their mouths.

“What happened today is really an attack on the other branches of government. We didn’t get simple yes or down votes,” said Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), who has agitated to limit the minority’s power for years. “This will be something that cannot stand as it is.”

“There’s a lot of us very concerned about Mel’s confirmation not taking place and the D.C. judge,” said Sen. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.). “It’s just astounding to me.”

Vice President Joe Biden — on Capitol Hill to swear in Cory Booker as New Jersey’s new Democratic senator — called the vote on Watt a “gigantic disappointment.”

“Mel Watt is absolutely, totally, thoroughly qualified,” Biden said.

The GOP blocked Watt’s nomination because they saw him as a political pick, rather than a housing policy expert.

Republicans objected to Millett because they believe the court has a minimal workload and they were worried that Obama is trying to stack the 11-seat bench ideologically. They contend that Senate Democrats made that same argument when President George W. Bush was trying to get his judges confirmed.

It was just Wednesday that the Senate was moving briskly through a stack of nominees and preserving the spirit of the deal brokered in July, approving a new head of the Office of Personnel Management. The talk of yet another fight over Senate rules so soon after the last one was too much for Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.).

“We’ve got to stop it. We’ve got to come together on these things and work it out, rather than have a godda— confrontation on the floor every time. So many of these guys have never been in the minority. They think the way to fix it is 51 votes,” McCain said.